Update on the Idaho State Moodle Pilot (posted on Jan 28, 2007)

This link points to the ISU Moodle Information page, (“This process follows on the 2005-6 evaluation of alternatives and possible selection of Moodle to succeed WebCT 4.1 in 2007”), which includes an update on their pilot:

The Moodle Pilot Report evaluates feedback from faculty members and students who have reviewed the Moodle 1.6 LMS software package in the fall 2006 semester. Based on the data collected from the student and faculty results, the ITRC proposes to expand the Moodle pilot into spring 2007 from 20 to 50 faculty members.

http://www.isu.edu/itrc/resources/moodle-info.shtml

Educause: Article on Open Source vs Proprietary.    (posted on October 25, 2006)
(PDF) In the article "Pioneering New Territory and Technologies", see the section starting on page 124:   "Open-Source Learning Management Systems: As Good As the Commercial Ones?" for a thoughtful perspective on the state of the art from the Educause Evolving Technologies committee.

http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/erm0659.pdf

UCLA Adopts Open Source Moodle as Campus CMS    (posted on January 09, 2007)
UCLA has decided to adopt the free, open source-based Moodle course management system as the single open source platform for its common collaboration and learning environment (CCLE)
(From: Campus Technology News Update: Tuesday, January 9, 2007 http://campustechnology.com/news_article.asp?id=19924&;typeid=150)References:
(UCLA CCLE Info: http://www.oit.ucla.edu/ccle/)
(FYI - Full UCLA IT Vision at http://www.oit.ucla.edu/CommonDocuments/ITPB_Brochure.pdf, 12 pages)

Course Management Systems - A Tipping Point    (posted on January 09, 2007)
Course Management Systems >> A Tipping Point
By Susan D. Heid
Long recognized as a magnet for new concepts and idea-sharing, the CMS as we’ve known it teeters on a precipice as institutions reassess need and warily eye the pitfalls that may lie ahead.

http://www.campustechnology.com/article.asp?id=19879

MIT Releases Peer Comparison of CMS Costs, Practices    (posted on January 09, 2007)
MIT has made available online a study it commissioned last year comparing course management system (CMS) practices and costs, as well as life cycle of course materials, at top universities.

http://web.mit.edu/emcc/www/MIT-WCET-C-LMS-Final-Report-07-19-06.pdf
(See just the summary in Campus Technology Jan 8 news update:
http://campustechnology.com/news_article.asp?id=19924&;typeid=150)

EduTools site    (posted on October 19, 2006)
"This site was built to assist higher education in using a more rational decision making process to review the many options for a course management system.
This site reviews each product by researching and describing more than 40 product features."

http://www.edutools.info/static.jsp?pj=8&page=HOME

Case Study - CSU Humboldt    (posted on December 14, 2006)
This is the Humboldt LMS Steering Committee wiki. (If prompted, just click the guest login button to access the wiki).

http://learn.humboldt.edu/course/view.php?id=7966
The vendor scenario is part of this list, but here's the link:
http://learn.humboldt.edu/mod/wiki/view.php?id=67358
They did a lot of campus surveys along the way. Check out this doc:
A Comparison of Satisfaction with Online Teaching and Learning Tools
http://www.humboldt.edu/~jdv1/moodle/all.htm

Case Study: CSU Chico 2005    (posted on October 20, 2006)
From the Executive Summary of the Final Committee Report:
An LMS II Strategic Review Committee was formed in January 2005 to examine options for a new enterprise Learning Management System (LMS) to carry CSU, Chico into the future. The solutions considered were Blackboard, Desire2Learn, WebCT Campus Edition, and WebCT Vista, as well as leading open source options Moodle and Sakai. All but Blackboard and WebCT Vista were demonstrated to be deficient during the preliminary investigation and were disqualified from further consideration.

http://www.csuchico.edu/tlp/LMS2/

Case Study: CSU Chico Evaluation Questions - LMS features    (posted on October 20, 2006)
This is the 15 page list of evaluation questions the committee used as part of the evaluation process. It contains questions regarding functionality, adaptability, and support issues.

http://www.csuchico.edu/tlp/LMS2/LMS II All_Questions.pdf

Case Study: Idaho State U, 2006    (posted on October 30, 2006)
"The learning management systems (LMS) Focus Group Report evaluates feedback by Idaho State University (ISU) faculty members, students, support staff, and assessment officer review of WebCT 6.0, Sakai 2.0, and Moodle 1.5 LMS software packages."

http://www.isu.edu/itrc/resources/LMS_Focus_Group_Report.pdf

Case Study: U of Iowa 2005    (posted on October 30, 2006)
"Beginning in February 2005, the University has been searching for a single enterprise CMS vendor whose product is:
- easy to use and intuitive, encouraging faculty adoption despite busy schedules,
- yet also has a full-featured enterprise architecture, allowing efficient implementation of complex tasks, supporting advanced systems integration and distance and nontraditional initiatives."

http://www.uiowa.edu/~provost/elearning/cms_selection/

Blackboard offers Assessment tools    (posted on January 17, 2007)
Jan. 17, 2007
The New Assessment Market
Blackboard on Tuesday announced officially (as it had been suggesting less officially for several months) that it was offering products in a new line - assessment - from individual courses to entire institutions....

http://insidehighered.com/news/2007/01/17/blackboard

News: Drop Patent, Educause Urges Blackboard    (posted on October 30, 2006)
The leaders of higher educations main technology association have written a powerfully worded letter urging Blackboard to relinquish the rights it gained under a controversial patent of online learning technologies in the public domain and to drop a patent infringement lawsuit it filed in August against a Canadian competitor, Desire2Learn.

http://insidehighered.com/news/2006/10/27/educause

Open Source Primer: Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source

Links to recent Campus Technology articles    (posted on October 20, 2006)
"Special Report : Open Source Vision," By Matt Villano (Campus Technology, 7/1/2006)
Increasingly, colleges and universities are turning to open source as a way to meet their technology infrastructure and application needs. It's time to weigh the benefits and the challenges.

http://www.campustechnology.com/article.asp?id=18779

Open Source Software: Should You Bet Your Career On It? By Stephen R. Acker and Peter E. Murray (Campus Technology, 7/19/2006)
For most universities, a decision to introduce new software should be made with the expectation that the choice will hold for three to seven years until the campus again finds its groove. So change is not taken lightly, and the risk of change must be projected over time and discounted back to the present.

http://www.campus-technology.com/news_article.asp?id=18907&typeid=155

Reference Docs: Oakland University (Minn)    (posted on October 23, 2006)
Check out Oakland's "Learning Management Software Transition Papers". They did an evaluation and generated some interesting and informative documentation. They arrived at Moodle as their open source alternative.

http://www2.oakland.edu/elis/policies.cfm

Resource: Michael Feldstein's e-Literate blog    (posted on October 30, 2006)
Feldstein is one of the best and most often cited folks who tracks the state of affairs in e-learning and in particular the LMS world.

http://mfeldstein.com/

Resource: Swiss Evaluation - Killer Criteria    (posted on October 30, 2006)
Worth checking out the list that the Edutech group used for deal killers in their evaluation of open source LMS's, as an example of how they are identified and applied.

http://www.edutech.ch/lms/ev3/opensource_lms_longlist.php

Resource: Swiss Evaluation of Open Source LMS's    (posted on October 30, 2006)
" In 2005 the edutech group was repeatedly asked by members of the Swiss e-learning community to report on the quality of current open source (OS) e-learning management systems (LMS) or course management systems (CMS). Since our last evaluation in 2003, which considered only commercial products, many open source products have improved in quality and gained considerable acceptance in higher education organizations."

http://www.edutech.ch/lms/ev3/